2014 All Flash Systems Brand Leaders – IT Brand Pulse

IT Brand Pulse, in research, data and analysis about data center infrastructure, will be honoring innovation leaders in fourteen SSD product categories at Flash Memory Summit. It will also present awards to three individuals for contributions to SSD innovation over the past five years. All winners were voted by IT pros in the 2014 SSD brand leader surveys.

On Wednesday, August 6, two awards ceremonies take center stage at the Flash Memory Summit in the Santa Clara Convention Center:

• 2014 Special Achievement Awards – Contributions to SSD Innovation at 11:30 a.m., Mission City Ballroom (immediately before Steve Wozniak’s Keynote). Awards will be presented to Amazon, eBay and Tom Isakovich.
• 2014 SSD Innovation Leader Awards at 3:30 pm, FMS Theatre (Exhibit Hall; #802). Awards will be presented to twelve winners: Dell/EqualLogic, EMC, Fusion-io (IO Turbine), IBM, LSI (SandForce), NetApp, Nimbus Data, QLogic, SanDisk, Samsung, Violin Memory, and VMware.

“We identified fourteen distinct flash storage product categories in 2014,” said Frank Berry, CEO and analyst, IT Brand Pulse. “In this still emerging market, IT pros selected 12 different innovation leaders, with EMC and Fusion-io the only companies chosen in more than one category.”
 
IT pros selected three leaders for contributions to SSD innovation (2009-2014):

• Amazon was the overwhelming favorite for the company that contributed most to innovation in enterprise cloud storage during the last 5 years.
• eBay (featured in Nimbus Data marketing materials) was the respondents’ choice as the IT organization contributing most to innovation in all flash storage arrays from 2009 to present.
• Tom Isakovich, CEO of Nimbus Data (and one of the last all-flash company CEOs who is hands-on from engineering to sales), received the award from voters for the individual who contributed most to innovation in all flash storage arrays over the past half-decade.

Other companies that stood out in minds of IT pros for SSD innovation in 2014 include:

• Dell/EqualLogic, the leader in any form of iSCSI storage, was chosen innovation leader for all flash iSCSI SSD Arrays.
• EMC, the overall storage brand leader, received two innovation leader awards: hybrid HDD/SSD and all flash system management software.
• Fusion-io, the company that defined the all-flash PCI adapter market, also captured two awards. For the third year in a row, it was named innovation leader for PCIe SSD DAS adapters, and added an innovation award this year for flash cache software.
• IBM, the all-flash array revenue market-share leader according to Gartner, was the top innovation leader vote-getter for all flash FC SSD arrays.
• LSI, and their SandForce branded product line, was picked for the third time as innovation leader for SSD controller chips.
• NetApp, the company that pioneered modern enterprise NAS storage, was the favorite for innovation leader in all flash NAS SSD arrays.
• Nimbus Data, who established early incumbency in all flash arrays, held their brand leadership position in scoring an innovation leader three-peat for all flash unified SSD arrays.
• QLogic, inventor of this class of product, was voted for the second year (in as many surveys) as the innovation leader for PCIe SSD SAN adapters.
• SanDisk took home its first innovation title in our annual surveys by capturing memory channel storage.
• Samsung, a flash memory pioneer and global market share leader, was a repeat innovation leader in the SAS/SATA SSD module category.
• Violin Memory, who recently went public, was picked by IT professionals as the all flash IB SSD innovation leader.
• VMware, the leader in everything virtual, led the way in another new product category in the 2014 SSD brand leader survey by winning the innovation leader award for virtual server cache software.

About Brand Leader Surveys
IT Brand Pulse awards are the symbols for brand leadership. Winners are voted by IT pros in surveys that are independent, non-sponsored research. The surveys are designed to measure the pulse of brand leadership in specific product categories. Within each product category, respondents choose the overall market leader, as well as the leader in price, performance, reliability, service and support, and innovation. Respondents are provided with a category description at the start of each product section, a randomized choice of vendor answers, and the ability to write-in a vendor if not listed.

Respondents to our surveys have included (select list)
AT&T – Server Administrator/Architect; Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (BCBSA) – Storage Administrator/Architect; Boeing – Data Center Manager; Booz Allen Hamilton – Network Security Architect; CalPERS, State of CA – Network Administrator/Architect; Caterpillar – Server Administrator/Architect; Citigroup – Network Administrator/Architect; City of Los Angeles – IT Manager/Director; Delta Airlines – Server Administrator/Architect; Duke University – IT Manager/Director; EarthLink – Server Administrator/Architect; Environmental Protection Agency – Network Administrator/Architect; ExxonMobil – Network Administrator/Architect; Fermilab – Network Administrator/Architect; Ford Motor company – Network Administrator/Architect; GE – IT Manager/Director; General Dynamics – Network Administrator/Architect; General Motors – Server Administrator/Architect; Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab – IT Manager/Director; JP Morgan – IT Manager/Director; Lockheed Martin – IT Manager/Director; Los Alamos National Lab (LANL) – Network Administrator/Architect; Lowe’s – Storage Administrator/Architect; Mattel Inc.- IT Manager/Director; Morgan Stanley – Network Administrator/Architect; NASA – IT Manager/Director; National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA) – Network Administrator/Architect; National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) – IT Manager/Director; Northrop Grumman – Network Administrator/Architect; Oppenheimer – Executive/Management; PepsiCo – Storage Administrator/Architect; Porsche Cars North America – Network Administrator/Architect; REI – Server Administrator/Architect; Sandia National Labs – Network Administrator/Architect; Shell – Storage Administrator/Architect; Social Security Administration (SSA) – Server Administrator/Architect; Stanford University – Network Administrator/Architect; Staples – Network Administrator/Architect; Target – IT Manager/Director; The University of Chicago – Server Administrator/Architect; Thomson Reuters -Server Administrator/Architect; T-Mobile – Data Center Manager; Transamerica – Storage Administrator/Architect; UBS – Executive/Management; UCLA – IT Manager/Director; United Airlines – Network Administrator/Architect; Universal Parks and Resort – IT Manager/Director; University Of Michigan- Data Center Manager; University of Michigan Medical School – IT Manager/Director; University of Notre Dame – Storage Administrator/Architect; USC – Network Administrator/Architect; Verizon – Network Administrator/Architect; Yale University – IT Manager/Director, among others.